Flex 3 Courseware Review, Part 1: Developing Rich Client Applications

Developing Rich Client Applications is the beginner's class that any new Flex developer should be required to take. It gives all of the necessary content for developing Flex applications - which cannot be emphasized enough after reviewing the Flex 3 training materials. It is a much tighter class, covering even more content, while trimming other, less important lessons.

If you want to see the new course outline, you can go here. Instructors familiar with this course will notice a few things that are different about this outline right off the bat. First off, there are a few lessons that have been removed entirely: Simple Controls, Layout using Containers, and Repeaters. Also, there are new lessons that have been added: An overview of the course, and Creating Data Entry Forms. First off, let's talk about what has been removed.

The cuts from the training materials are great, removing just the right amount of 'bloat' from the Flex 2 courseware. The lessons that were cut were either extraneous (Simple Controls and Container Layout) or covered outdated concepts (Repeater). In the case of the former, controls and containers are covered again and again in not only the walkthroughs, but the Labs as well. Giving these topics their own lessons always felt like an unnecessary review -they were always the first lessons I trimmed down if I knew I was going to be short of time for a class.

As for the added material, they do nothing but help. The introductory lesson at the start of the class gives students just that much more expectation for what will be presented over the next three days - what they will learn, how they will learn, and how they will review. It encapsulates something that typically I covered in the beginning of the class on my own, and I can only assume that, with this content's inclusion in the courseware, other instructors were doing the same. The lesson on Creating Data Forms acts as a remedy for an issue some students have brought up either after class or during breaks: the inclusion of more functional examples that are analogous to everyday usage and situations. Forms, their use, and their relationship to the data they contain, is something all developers deal with at some point. Further, this lesson is an example of using knowledge students have already gained in the class - it uses Binding, Data Models, and Custom Events to create a real-world example that students can reference. Kudos!

The rest of the content is pretty straightforward: besides a few changes in walkthroughs, some text, and updated images and graphs, the rest of the content is virtually unchanged. There is some reorganization of content internal to the lessons, but you can discover that while reviewing the materials. The few changes of note, however, are listed below:

1. Enhanced Constraints has been added to Lesson 5. It isn't a ton of content, but it is necessary. Enhanced Constraints are too cool not to cover, and they help get rid of the Grid class. And, if you've read my previous posts, that is such a good thing.
2. Skinning gets covered in Lesson 8. This is great, because I have always thought this was content that should have been covered in the Flex 2 materials. Again, its inclusion in the courseware shows that Adobe is listening to what students and trainers want, and responding accordingly.
3. Requests with parameters in HTTPService calls. Much like skinning, I thought not including this was a mistake in previous materials, since there is so very little covered about data exchange in this course. Granted, I can understand why it wasn't covered, but it is still good to see it re-integrated into this course.

Finally, you may notice that something is missing from my post, as well as the course outline. I didn't notice myself until I actually started writing this post, but I was shocked to see it not included in the courseware: AdvancedDataGrid. Now, maybe I'm just missing something, but isn't ADG one of the bigger additions to the Flex 3 SDK? Why isn't it included in the courseware? I've looked through the courseware for other classes, and I can't find any mention of it. If anyone has any more information about why AdvancedDataGrid isn't included in the courseware, I'd like to hear it. Otherwise... I'll just remain befuddled.

I'll have more posts on the other courses as soon as I can get to them. Stay tuned...